


Badlands

by Ravenspear



Series: Hell Ain't A Bad Place To Be [2]
Category: Incredible Hulk (2008), Iron Man (Movies), The Avengers (2012)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Dark, Gen, M/M, Pre-Relationship
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-05-13
Updated: 2012-05-13
Packaged: 2017-11-05 06:25:33
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,747
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/403370
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ravenspear/pseuds/Ravenspear
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Getting a traumatized Bruce Banner to Malibu is proving to be a bit harder than Tony might have prepared for.</p>
<p>(Also, honesty has never been Tony's strong suit.)</p>
            </blockquote>





	Badlands

Tony isn't a great fan of Nevada.

Sure, Las Vegas is the absolute best; booze and gambling and girls, and Tony could spend his life there if he didn't like his workshop so much.

But the rest... Yeah, he's not particularly fond of it.

Just... _Deserts._

Tony fucking _hates_ deserts. And cliffs. And sand. And the crush of nothing but sky looming over him.

It doesn't help that his father's ghost seems to float over every inch of ground. Howard Stark had given America the nuclear bomb, and this vast emptiness had seen so much of his work that it sets Tony's teeth on edge just to breathe the air.

While Tony drives, Bruce Banner sleeps curled up in the back seat. He doesn't look peaceful in the least; still drawn and pale, his face a tense grimace, his body twitching like a coiled spring.

Tony thinks he should maybe be afraid, but he can't seem to muster up the feeling. The soul-deep sickness he'd felt in the bunker has burned the capability out of him, and all he can feel is rage, sympathy, righteousness.

And hate.

Hate is one of Tony's oldest friends, and when he looks at Banner in the rearview mirror, it curls up around his heart like a stinging caress, awful and (in a sick way) comforting at the same time.

He hates, and he keeps driving.

 

* * *

 

Things go wrong a few miles from California state lines.

The good doctor's altered physiology must have given him a viciously efficient resistance to sedatives, because Tony doubts another human could have even _survived_ the cocktail the scientists had him on, not even mentioning working it out of his system with a few hours of sleep.

Banner's twitching turns into actual movement, then distressed noises start tearing themselves from his abused throat, and suddenly he's up and panicked and screaming his head off.

Tony _could_ have tried to calm him down, but he's good at seeing what battles are already lost (and this one might have been lost for eight years), so he doesn't.

What he does is slide the visor down his face and evacuate the car as fast as he possibly can.

Which is a good choice, because only three seconds later the nondescript military SUV explodes around a really, really angry green monster.

Tony knows that this is the last thing he should have wanted to happen on this little excursion, but he can't help smiling under his visor, because the Hulk is _spectacular_.

The monster roars; a sound that is angry and hurt and so full of despair that Tony immediately reevaluates the assumption that the Hulk is a separate entity from Banner. Because that is a _man_ in pain, not anything mindless at all. 

And Tony isn't smiling anymore.

A car screeches to a stop a few yards from the wreckage of the SUV, and suddenly Tony remembers that he actually kind of has a problem here.

"Shit, shit, shit," he mutters as Hulk notices the silver sedan, and "oh fuck, even more shit," he continues when his infra-red sensors pick up three kids in the backseat. In his line of work, Tony's learned to not feel so much for civilian casualties, but dead kids has always made him need a drink, and he doesn't think he can deal with that on a day he has, in his head, fully dedicated to performing a heroic rescue.

So he shoots Banner in the head.

He knows it's safe, he's read the files, and it certainly gets the guy's attention.

So much so that the entire front carriage of the ripped apart SUV comes flying at him.

Definitely better than dead kids, but he might _really_ need to gain some altitude if the Hulk goes for the other half of the car.

And yeah, he probably should get him away from the road. Away from people, and back into the less-populated areas.

"Yeah, that's right, big guy!" he yells, volume turned up until the speakers crackle and whine, then he turns some AC/DC on as he shoots Banner in the head again. "Come at me, Kermit!"

...And apparently gamma-irradiated white men _can_ jump. _Far_.

Well, shit.

 

* * *

 

The Hulk is pretty much unstoppable, Tony finds. Nothing he does leaves even a bruise (not that he tries very hard, because... well, that's just not what this was supposed to be _about_ ), and the monster just doesn't get tired. So Tony hasn't really done all that much to try and stop the Hulk from laying waste to everything in his path. He's nudges him away from populated areas with repulsor blasts, ear-ringing metal, and some very creative insinuations as to Banner's parentage, and does his best to get unlucky civilians out of the way before Hulk smashes them.

It works out pretty well, and by nightfall the Hulk sits down somewhere in Arizona and sighs heavily. 

Tony stays his distance, waiting, and it takes twenty-seven minutes for the big guy to cool down enough for the transformation to happen.

He hadn’t really paid much attention when Banner transformed into his angrier self; it’d been too fast, and he’d been mostly concerned about getting himself away before he was squashed under a few tons of rage monster.

Now, though... Now he has all the time in the world (or as long as it can take the military to locate them and send out the troops, minus the past twenty-seven minutes), and while the transformation into the Hulk had been quick, the transformation back is _slow_.

It looks excruciating, the way bones snap and shrink and reform, and the way flesh and skin either shrinks too fast, splitting and bleeding, or too slow, sagging and heavy.

When it’s over, and Tony’s done throwing up, Banner just lies there on the ground, shaking and gasping, and he looks so small and vulnerable and hurt it makes Tony kind of want to throw up again.

Another five minutes, and Tony starts really worrying about possible military action.

Still. Can’t rush a good thing.

He’s very careful when he steps out from behind the rocks he’d taken shelter behind, makes lots of noise so Banner knows he’s coming, and tries to look as unthreatening as he possibly can in red and yellow armor that can double as a weapon of mass destruction. “Hey, you okay over there?”

Banner scrambles to his feet with a lot more speed and grace than Tony would have guessed him capable after the day he’s had, and looks like he might go into hysterics again. Which would be _bad_.

“Hey, don’t freak out.” He tries to sound as soothing as he possibly can. He doesn’t really know how to, never had a mother to shush his fears away, and his dad... Yeah, “soothing” was never part of his repertoire.

He tries his best, though, and it seems to work a bit, because while Banner is still tense and wary, he's still not green.

"Do you remember me?" Tony continues. "Tony Stark? I got you out of the bunker."

Banner frowns, and Tony wonders what so many years under constant sedation has done to the genius Tony's seen in dissertations and theses he'd read obsessively years ago.

"By the way, you look like you could use some food," he says, and it's not a lie. Banner is thin as a rake, and shaking from exhaustion. "You smashed a gas station next state over, and I confiscated you some food. And yes, I know, I know, rich people shop-lifting is so last decade, but I figured the world owed you some chips and protein bars. Oh, and I got you a Sprite, too. I hope you like Sprite."

Now Banner just looks sort of dumb-struck.

"It that a 'no' on the Sprite, then? Damn, I _knew_ I should have grabbed a Fanta instead."

"No..."

And that single word makes Tony light up in a way he might at some other point decide is embarrassing. Because Banner _talked_ , and Tony is the _man_.

"I... Sprite is... good," Banner rasps, voice dry and cracked and wavering, but he looks calm (calm- _ish_ , at least) and non-aggressive, and that is progress.

“Awesome,” Tony says, and slowly, with no sudden movements, walks over. Banner pretty much rips the bag of food from Tony’s hand, then backs up a bit, defensive and his eyes never leaving Tony’s face as he crouches down to rifle through the bag for the food.

He seems to hesitate a bit over whether to open the soft drink bottle, tests the lid a bit to check the seal, and flicks his eyes down to it a few times.

“I don’t blame you for being suspicious,” Tony says, sitting down on the ground and wishing he’d built the suit to be more comfortable in positions that weren’t standing straight. “But think of it logically. If I wanted to drug you and keep you under, why didn’t I do it in the car?”

“Maybe you did,” Banner counters, words clumsy and slow, like he has trouble remembering after so long (he probably _does_ ). “Miscalculated dosage.”

“Then why did I break you out?”

“Stark,” is all he says, eyes grave and challenging.

And yeah, that’s... Yeah.

Tony has to look away then, can’t... Can’t really answer that accusation, because weapons are his livelihood, his entire _life_. Because it’s not like he didn’t _think_ about it, when he first dug the files up from a closed military network.

“I didn’t break you out because I wanted a weapon,” he murmurs, and hates his voice for sounding anything but confident and suave and like Tony “Goddamn” Stark.

Banner just watches him gravely. “Then why?”

A hundred really good speeches runs through Tony’s mind. Like, _really_ good. Genius. The kind that would make liberal, anti-war press shut up because they actually _bought_ his rhetoric.

He doubts that would work, though. And even if it did, it wouldn’t feel right to lie here, in this moment, with those dark, tired eyes watching him.

“There’s a _line_ ,” is what he says, quietly, into the night air. “There _has_ to be. And they crossed it.” Because Tony has a line, and he keeps himself firmly on one side of it. Because he’s not a _monster_.

Banner watches him, silent, still, and Tony finds himself _hurting_ with how much he needs this man to not find him wanting.

Then Banner twists the cap and takes a drink.


End file.
